Case Study: Flocabulary

The Situation

Brooklyn-based EdTech startup Flocabulary is a learning program that uses educational hip-hop music to engage students in K-12 and increase achievement across the curriculum. The company’s primary consumers were teachers and school districts that used the learning tool in classrooms, but they wanted to expand their reach and engage mainstream audiences across the nation, and ultimately become a household name.

The platform was also gearing up to launch their first-ever educational app that would put their content directly into the hands of parents and kids. They needed help raising awareness of the new app and driving traffic for app downloads.

Strategy

RLM PR launched an aggressive public relations campaign for Flocabulary focusing on raising awareness of the EdTech platform and driving traffic to their new app.

Over the course of the campaign we employed a multipronged approach, focusing on high quality content, company profile/startup story and thought leadership.

The first step was to highlight Flocabulary’s library of music videos, learning resources, and special programs in order to galvanize audiences and rouse excitement around the company. To do this we secured coverage in outlets with significant reach such as Buzzfeed and HuffPost, and also targeted family & parenting, education, and mobile app sites.

To establish Flocabulary as a leading EdTech startup, we secured company profiles in top-tier outlets such as Forbes, NBC, CBS, The CW, and other business, technology, and media industry outlets. Additionally, we facilitated interviews with the CEO, company employees and customers who use the program, to substantiate Flocabulary’s results in increasing student achievement.

Finally, to build thought leadership within the company and position the founder as an authority in his field, we crafted article ideas and topics for contributed content and secured bylines in PopSugar and The Hill, among others. Additionally, we facilitated press opportunities at conferences and events and connected the CEO to reporters and top media outlets.

Results

RLM PR established Flocabulary as a top education platform in the country, reaching a broad and diverse audience and positioning the app as a valuable resource for parents and kids.

We secured coverage on over 30 top-tier sites such as Buzzfeed, HuffPost, PopSugar, Forbes, CBS, among many others, with a combined potential reach of billions of impressions.

The Flocabulary app was selected by Apple as the #1 “New Apps We Love” on the Apple Store, and was downloaded almost 10,000 times in the first month. Additionally, the app was also included in Apple’s top 15 “free to try” education apps list.

Coverage highlights include:

Buzzfeed, “This Is The Coolest Way To Teach Your Kids About Black History”.
Huffpost, “14 Teachers On How They Spread Love In The Classroom”.
CBS News, “Students learn through lyrics with Flocabulary”.
Popsugar, “Why It’s So Important to Teach Black History Now More Than Ever”.
Forbes, “Global EdTech Investments And Outlook: 10 EdTech Companies You Should Know About”.

Category

Earned Media, Education, Entertainment, Issues

Tags

Arts, Communication, Internet, Music

Date published

April 5, 2018